THE NEWSPAPER OF THE SALISH,PEND'd OR1ELLES AND KOOTENAI TRIBES OF THE FLATHEAD RESERVATION
15C
HARKOOSTA
Volume 4 ¦ Number 1 New Moon of the Blooming Bitterroot May 1,1974
County, Tribes Working Out Food Stamp Plan
Commodities Drying Up, Food Stamps by July 1
Poison: For better or for worse, food stamps are about to become a fact of life on the Flathead Reservation.
The venerable old commodity program will die a slow death by June 3 0 of this year and low-income people on the reservation will have to learn how to use food stamps Food Stamps are coupons which needy persons buy at a discount and use to purchase food from participating food stores.
Details on exactly how the Tribe or the reservation counties will administer the new foods program are not completely clear yet. The Tribal Council and Lake County Commissioners were to have met in Ronan April 18 to work out a plan to switch the county from commodities to food stamps. Commissioner William Burley assured the Council that the county was working on the problems and would keep the tribe informed.
Among the many problems to be worked out before food stamps can become available to county needy is the question of who will ultimately have responsibility for Indian recipients. The County protested the switch last year on the basis that it had neither the funds to expand the current welfare system to include food stamp certification and distribution, nor the legal authority to prosecute food stamp law violations.
The County pointed out in a statement of protest to the IKS.D.A. last fall that the con-current jurisdiction agreement between the Tribe, State and Federal Government would not allow them to enforce food stamp laws against enrolled Indians on the reservation. They also noted that in spite of their legal inability to enforce laws, they would be held accountable for illegally distributed food stamps.
The Tribe, for their part, are also reluctant to let the County run the whole show. Tribal authorities and CHRs fear that non-members would tend to be less sensitive about special Indian needs and problems and that a county controlled food stamp program might eliminate many Indian families which have a real need for extra assistance. The tribe is currently operating the commodities food program for both the reservation counties and the Indian people and the feeling is that they have the experience and the cultural background to deal more effectively in food distribution.
Indian authorities have also noted other possible compli-
cations in a county-controlled food stamp program. They say that Indians in distant communities would be forced to travel to Poison two, three or more times per month to satisfy the additional certification red tape and pick up their stamps. They point out that a number of long hair families may have difficulty understanding the hodge-podge of technical requirements and might be inclined to forget about stamps rather than go through what they might view as a (Turn to FOOD STAMPS on page 3)
Mission Unit Logging Will Be Delayed
Dixon: Scheduled logging projects in the Mission Mountains will be delayed until a special "clean logging" pilot program has been completed and reviewed.
The action, taken by the Tribal Council April 12, will delay the scheduled start of several Mission mountain foothill logging projects for at least one year, it was estimated. The Ashley Unit, located between McDonald and Mission Lakes on the valley-facing slopes of the Missions, was to have been sold this fall. It would have been the first of eight units along the Mission foothills between Ronan and St. Ignatius to be logged over the next six years. The total volume of the eight scheduled sales would be 2 2 3,0 0 0,0 0 0 board feet.
This latest Council action over the controversial Mission projects was based on the recommendations of the Economic Development Committee. The sale of the 9,000,000 board feet Ashley unit was turned over to the committee by council action two weeks earlier. The committee was instructed to consider a plan to log the unit using horse and tired skidding with road construction only in draws and report its findings back to the Council. The motion during the March 21 meeting, to log the unit with these restrictions, was made by Councilman E.W. Morigeau, Poison. That motion was modified to give the EDC Committee the power to review the restrictions with a second by Councilman Pat Lefthand, Elmo.
In reviewing the proposed logging plan, the committee......
composed of Morigeau, Committee Chairman Vic Stinger, Pablo, Thorns "Bearhead" Swaney, St. Ignatius, and John Malatare, Arlee..concluded that the Morigeau plan constituted an experimental procedure and should not, therefore, be applied to a moderately large unit such as the Ashley.
The committee also reviewed six logging methods posed as alternatives for the Ashley Unit by the Bureau of Indian Affairs Forestry Department. The BIA alternatives ranged (Turn to MISSIONS on page 2)